Things to Do With Kids in Queens on January 7

Find free and low-cost things to do with kids in Queens today, January 7, including fun activities and events the whole family can enjoy. See what's going on today in Queens's museums, galleries, and libraries for some educational fun; in the parks, for outdoor and nature activities; and in the theaters, for children's concerts and performances. Plus, get details and directions on any street fairs or holiday festivals happening January 7. For even more free and low-cost upcoming events in Queens, check out our complete calendar of events.

Looking for a great program where your little one will learn and you can bond with your child and other parents? Here's your opportunity to join the Little Learners at the Little Neck Children’s Center, led by certified teachers and parent coaches. This interactive program encourages social development along with listening and thinking skills, while providing time for parents to socialize. The Open House will answer your questions and help you register. Call Janet Pearson or email cclnsecretary@verizon.net for more information.

Marvel at homemade gingerbread houses that are drafted, designed, baked, planned, built and decorated by chef Jon Lovitch over the course of an entire year. GingerBread Lane is made from only “real” edible ingredients: gingerbread, royal icing and candy. Last year’s GingerBread Lane at NYSCI was recognized as the largest gingerbread village in the world by the 2014 Guinness World Records. Children under 18 must be accompanied by an adult. Exhibit ends at 1pm on Jan 11, 2015.

It's easy! Kids tell Ms. Lucy about every book they've read on their own reading level, either to themselves or someone else, and earn a star. The four readers with the most stars every Friday will win a cool prize. Kids must be age 12 or under to participate.

Jon Lovitch is a chef and the creator of GingerBread Lane, an annual display of homemade and handmade gingerbread houses that he drafts, designs, bakes, plans, builds, and decorates for an entire year. This season will be its 21st.
The concept for Gingerbread Lane changes each year, depending on what Lovitch has seen at gingerbread competitions, in magazines, at holiday displays, sometimes even drawing ideas from houses he spots while driving.
Lovitch purchases the materials after the holiday season, and begins designing and constructing the exhibit by March. All work is completed by late October and reviewed for detail until the exhibit begins. Beginning in November, Lovitch works between 80 and 90 hours for the final three weeks before GingerBread Lane opens for display. Each gingerbread house requires approximately three hours to complete and many of the complicated projects within the village require upwards of 35 hours. Each annual GBL takes about 1500 hours to make.
GBL is made from only "real" edible ingredients: gingerbread, royal icing, and candy. In contrast, other gingerbread competitors use dried pasta, uncooked rice and beans, and edible clay, among other ingredients. This year, GBL uses both gingerbread bricks and candy bricks for the structures.
The 2014 GBL weighs more than 1.5 tons, covers a continuous surface of nearly 300 square feet and is 11 feet high at its highest point. It will be competing for a Guinness World Record for largest gingerbread exhibit, and will be the largest GBL ever.
While the layout and composition change yearly, GBL always includes Eggnog Bay, Gum Drop Row, Peppermint Central Park, Candy Cane Place, and Toffee Boulevard. New this year is Ribbon Candy Ridge and a "behind-the-scenes" window, giving a peek into the makings of GBL with ovens, models, and ingredients...made entirely from royal icing. Five two-foot-high nutcrackers, also made of royal icing, stand guard over the back of the exhibit.
This year's village includes an estimated 1750 lbs. of icing, 400 lbs. of candy, and 500 lbs. of gingerbread dough; and comprises 152 gingerbread houses, 65 trees, four gingerbread cable cars, five gingerbread train cars, an underground candy subway station, candy trees, and sugar signage.
GingerBread Lane always sits out in the open, rather than behind glass, a fact that can really be appreciated when one smells the homemade gingerbread.
All gingerbread structures are given away free on the last day of the exhibit. Since December 2000, GingerBread Lane has also hosted annual workshops for families and after-school programs for children. Each year, Lovitch works with underprivileged and disabled children by shipping GingerBread Lane pieces across the country for those unable to view the display.
gingerbread-lane.org; Twitter: @GingerBreadLane; Facebook: GingerBread Lane, #gingerbreadlane.

Marvel at homemade gingerbread houses that are drafted, designed, baked, planned, built and decorated by chef Jon Lovitch over the course of an entire year. GingerBread Lane is made from only “real” edible ingredients: gingerbread, royal icing and candy. Last year’s GingerBread Lane at NYSCI was recognized as the largest gingerbread village in the world by the 2014 Guinness World Records. Children under 18 must be accompanied by an adult. Exhibit ends at 1pm on Jan 11, 2015.

Inspired by Native American and African beadwork, artist, Sesheta (Tanya) Holder creates handmade pieces incorporating symbols from ancient cultures. Using colors, crystals and beads, she looms and weaves a wearable piece of art that offers strength and encouragement. Come explore the symbols in her personal collection and discover which symbols hold meaning for you.

Animation director and artist Charles Martin aka Chuck? Jones (1912-2002) made some of the most enduringly popular cartoons of all time. He perfected the wisecracking Bugs Bunny and the exasperated Daffy Duck, and created a host of other characters, including Pep? Le Pew, Wile E. Coyote, and the Road Runner, bringing an unparalleled talent for comic invention and a flair for creating distinctive, memorable characters to the art of film animation. In a career spanning three decades, Jones directed more than 300 animated films, and was given an Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement.
What's Up, Doc? The Animation Art of Chuck Jones explores Jones's creative genius, as well as the influences he drew on from the fine arts and popular culture, and the legacy of his work on the field of animation. The exhibition features 23 of Chuck Jones's animated films, interactive experiences, and more than 125 original sketches and drawings, storyboards, production backgrounds, animation cels, and photographs, demonstrating how Jones and his collaborators worked together to create some of the greatest cartoons ever made. The films include such classic Warner Bros. cartoons as What's Opera, Doc? and One Froggy Evening; the Academy Award-winning short film The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics, which expanded the boundaries of the medium with its experimental techniques; and such classic television specials as Dr. Seuss's How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The exhibition runs through Jan 19.
The exhibition is a partnership between the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the Chuck Jones Center for Creativity, and Museum of the Moving Image.

The Holiday Train Show is a New York tradition that will delight children and adults of all ages; now in its 23rd year.
Over 20 large-scale model railway trains and trolleys, from American steam engines and streetcars from the late 1800s to modern freight and high-speed passenger trains, traverse nearly a quarter-mile of track. Across rustic bridges, along overhead trestles, through tunnels, and past waterfalls that cascade into flowing creeks.
The trains travel through a magical New York amid the glow of twinkling lights in
NYBG's Victorian-style glasshouse, the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory.
It's not just the trains that the crowds come to see. The show features beautiful replicas of New York landmarks, artistically crafted of natural materials such as bark, twigs, stems, fruits, seeds, and pine cones by designer Paul Busse's team at Applied Imagination. The original Pennsylvania Station and Yankee Stadium, St.Patrick's Cathedral, Radio City Music Hall, the Brooklyn Bridge, and Rockefeller Center are
among the favorites in the Botanical Garden's collection of more than 150
replicas.
This year only, in celebration of the 50th anniversary of the 1964 New York's World
Fair held in Queens, the Holiday Train Show features replicas of the World's Fair-famed
Unisphere, observatory towers, and the Tent of Tomorrow at the New York State Pavilion, all from the Paul Busse Collection.
There is also a plethora of accompanying programming, including children's activities, poetry, classical music, cocktail evenings, and more. Check the website for more details. Advanced booking recommended.

Inspired by the generous donation of over 1,200 medium format color slides taken by fashion photographer Jerry Kean and theater photographer Van Williams at the 1964-65 Fair, this exhibit reveals materials from the museum's permanent collection never seen before by the public such as vintage photographs, albums and scrapbooks, ephemera and books such as "How to Make Good Pictures," a Kodak publication from the '30s.

Inspired by the donation of 1,200 Ektachrome slides taken by photographers Jerry Kean and Van Williams at the 1964-54 Fair, this exhibition will reveal materials from the museum’s permanent collection never seen before by the public as well as artifacts from local and national collections. This exhibit will be on view through Feb 8, 2015.

This exhibition traces the fascinating history of the Astoria studio, which has been at the heart of filmmaking in New York City since 1920. The site was the East Coast home of Paramount Pictures in the silent and early talking-picture eras, a center for independent filmmaking in the 1930s, and the U.S. Army Pictorial Center from World War II into the Cold War. After falling into disrepair in the early 1970s, the site has become a thriving cultural hub that includes Kaufman Astoria Studios and Museum of the Moving Image.

The historical society for the largest borough in New York City is dedicated to preserving the history of Queens through educational programs, exhibitions and its role as a local history research center.
An exhibition on the 1939 and 1964 World�s Fairs from the perspective of the common visitor through artifacts and photographs from individual collections.

The ideal space to explore, discover and build! Little ones can experience multi-sensory activities in a safe, protected area and is specially designed to meet the developmental needs of children ages birth to 6 years old. Sing-alongs, story times and art activities are featured during weekends and holidays. This program is available thru June 30, 2015.

Using the incredibly immersive power of specialist 3D cameras, audiences are transported to another world to experience the titanic battles tiny creatures face to survive. A chipmunk in a wild wood and a grasshopper mouse in Arizona's scorched deserts are both forced to grow up fast when they find themselves alone for the first time. Only by using their ingenious superpowers can these hidden creatures survive.
Tiny Giants is produced by BBC Earth and narrated by Golden Globe nominee Stephen Fry (Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows, The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug).
Tiny Giants will be shown daily in the Museum's Samuel J. and Ethel LeFrak Theater, in 2D at 10:30 am and 12:30 pm, and in 3D at 11:30 am, 1:30, 2:30, 3:30, and 4:30 pm. Times are subject to change.

The core exhibition of the Museum, a one-of-a-kind experience that immerses visitors in the creative and technical process of producing, promoting, and presenting films, television shows, and digital entertainment. Occupying 15,000 square feet of the Museum's second and third floors, the exhibition reveals the skills, material resources, and artistic decisions that go into making moving images. Behind the Screen also introduces visitors to the history of the moving image, from nineteenth-century optical toys to the present-day impact of digital tools on film editing and post-production. Children under the age of fourteen must be accompanied by an adult of eighteen years or older.
Artifacts: The exhibition incorporates approximately 1,400 artifacts from the Museum's collection of the material culture of the moving image. These include historic film and television cameras, projectors, television sets, sound recording equipment, costumes, set design sketches and models, make-up, fan magazines, posters, and an outstanding collection of licensed merchandise?dolls, toys, board games, lunch boxes, and more. The Museum has also been a pioneer in collecting video arcade and console games, which are on exhibit and available for play by visitors. Recently acquired objects on view include makeup used on the stars of Sex in the City, a mechanical prop designed by Mike Marino for a climactic scene in Black Swan, and molds and prototypes produced during the creation of a King Kong action figure.
Computer-based interactive experiences: Visitors may record their own movements as a sequence of still photographs that can be printed out and made into a flipbook; create their own stop-motion animations, which they can save and email; record their voices over dialogue from a film, following the same procedure that actors use when dubbing their lines in post-production; choose sound effects to add to the images of well-known movies and television shows; add music to scenes from movies, and to experience how music affects mood and tone.
Audio-visual material: Behind the Screen includes nearly four hours of audio-visual material that ranges from film clips related to the artifacts on display; projections of the earliest kinetoscope films, The Great Train Robbery, and selections from The Jazz Singer and Nanook of the North, all of which bring key moments in film history vividly to life; special videos, including The First Movies about Etienne Jules Marey and Chuck Workman's Precious Images; and a simulation of a live TV control room, taking visitors inside the room where director Bill Webb called the shots for the broadcast of a game between the New York Mets and San Diego Padres.
Commissioned artworks: Artworks created especially for incorporation into Behind the Screen are Tut's Fever by Red Grooms and Lysiane Luong, a real movie theater equipped for video that seats thirty-five; TV Lounge by Jim Isermann, an environment resembling a 1960s living room; and Feral Fount by Gregory Barsamian, a stroboscopic zoetrope using 97 sculptures rotating on an armature to create a short animation.

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